Latest / Backchecking the Bolts / Lightning Win Streak Continues Ottawa & Nashville Recap + Canadiens Preview + Tortorella to Vegas
Transcript
- Jason Linkes: Coming up next on back checking the bolts. That's not John Torreirella right there. He's going to them block shots. Yeah. Yeah. It's right. Yeah. Tammy Panarin. You're going to be blocking shots, buddies. He kind of raises your middling players up, but he brings down, you know, some of your, your top end talent. That being said, if you're a top end talent who shows that you could play responsibly, he's going to let you play as much as you want. Welcome to back checking the bolts. Back checking the bolts is your cup of coffee to get you the latest on the Tampa Bay lightning. Join host Jason Linkus and the managing editor of Raw Charge, Justin Godfrey, as they break down the Lightning's most recent games and go beyond the highlights, telling you what the box scores didn't. It's time to drop the puck. Welcome to back checking the bolts. Hi everybody. I'm your host Jason link us and I'm here with the managing editor of raw charge He is Justin Godfrey. You could see him at www.rawcharge.com on today's episode We are gonna recap this weekend's games against Ottawa and Nashville We're gonna preview the upcoming Montreal game on Tuesday night And I'm gonna ask Justin. Is this a good possible first round playoff matchup? John tortorella is back in the league Yes, it's another team and John tortorello with eight games left is taking over the Vegas golden Knights. We'll also have the nurture marketing trivia question of the day and we'll find out what's new at raw charge. Now I'm going to bring in the managing editor of raw charge. He's Justin Godfrey. Justin quick thoughts on the weekend series. What did you think? Hey, what points is four points, right? It doesn't matter how you get them. Just as long as you put them in the bank. And, I think I wouldn't. Quite calm carbon copy games, but a lot of similarities of what we've been seeing over the last week. You know, slightly get down early, rally back, save their best two periods for the last two periods, and then pick up two points and move on with their lives. A lot of hockey this weekend, some of it good, a lot of it bad, but in the end, you know, four points or four points and you can't ask for anything else this time of year. They've had points in eight straight games ever since they went out West, but Justin, in these two games. Let's start with the Ottawa game. Once again, it was another slow first period start. This time, Dylan Cousins scored right off the bat against Vasileski, one that he would like back. That was not a good goal. It definitely hasn't been the goaltenders fault for most of this little weird stretch that they're in, that one, and it's funny because you spend 48 hours talking about the Lightning need better starts, the Lightning need better starts. They have to get out there and they... You have to take it to the other team and then yeah, 18 seconds in, know, they're down one, nothing, four minutes in, they're down two, nothing. And you're like, ⁓ great. Yeah. Awesome. This is, this is a bit right guys. You're just like, you're just doing this for fun at this point, but yeah, they're, they're kind of like the boxer that needs to get punched in the face, you know, before they wake up and realize they're in a fight. It's such ⁓ a change in, in style of play between the first period, second period, third periods. And it's just so, you know, I don't know if I've seen a. Jekyll and Hyde team like this in quite such a time because that Ottawa game, I mean, they absolutely dominated after the second period on and third period against Nashville was all lightning last night. it's just a tale of two teams as I keep throwing out the literary references. Thanks for that liberal arts education guys. It's just a really interesting stretch and go watching them play. I don't know what to make of it. But they're going to figure it out. So who's watched hockey for a while. would rather have a bad first period than a bad third period. So they're not, it's not like they're getting leads and then giving them away. Yes, they're down early, but this is a veteran team, a lot of experience on it. They don't get rattled. So it's nice to see a team that can play from behind sometimes. Especially when the playoffs come around, you're going to, you know, you're going to be in this situation where you're down in the second period and you know, can you rally back? And they're showing that they can. If we're to pull any positive out of this. You'd like to see the way they respond to these goals and these deficits. So hopefully they can keep it going and then mix in a few leads every once in a while. that was different in this weekend set was there was no Nikita Kucherov. Kucherov was out with an illness, missed both games. So there's going to be some line juggling. What did you see with the lines that were different with Kucherov out of the lineup? I five on five, it was okay. Cooper really kind of mixed things up. mean, I think. We saw Corey Perry up on the top line for a little bit. I'm playing with, you know, Hagel and. So rally. God, how can I forget Anthony Sorrelli? But, I think you saw, uh, yeah, a little bit of line early in the morning, bud. Exactly. Yeah. It's been a long, you know, you know, Cooper's talking about fatigue. You know, I know what the boy's talking about. It's not that much different in real life here. Anyways, a lot of line juggling. think you, mostly saw it on the power play, especially against Nashville. They managed to score a goal on the power play against Ottawa. But like against Nashville, you just saw how important he is, you know, in terms of moving the puck around. The light knew we're really forced to just kind of whip it around the perimeter and make a lot of passes. Their entries weren't as good. You know, that's kind of part of his underrated game is his ability to get the puck into the zone and set them up. So you missed a lot of that. I thought they played pretty well without him and he kept scoring goals. They scored about seven goals. A little, I don't know if you caught the end of the game, but a little bit of betters, bad luck at the end. Kensal? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. You had the lightning minus one and a half. You were not a happy man yesterday, but, a person yesterday. yeah. ⁓ know, I'm not going to lie after the second period. I saw that in Pennsylvania, the lightning were minus one 30 on the money line. And so I grabbed that and they actually played a pretty good third period, especially early on. were all over Nashville after they got the lead. Then they sort of sat back a little bit and just made sure they protected it yesterday. thought you Hanson played really well. thought he played a really good first period. two goals. I'm still not sure how the first one was allowed. I, again, we talked about NHL goaltender interference is like saying what it catches in the NFL. I'm not sure how a goalie who gets plowed into that goal is allowed. I'm sorry. I'm just not. It's, mean, They said it on the ice, you know, was Chernak's fault. And at the same token, can't have your defender shove another guy into your goalie and expect it not to count. So I don't think Chernak had a really great game against Nashville. He had that play where he shoved the young kid into Johansson. And then at the end, he took a bad penalty. You're protecting a lead. You get a two minute penalty and then you get a 10 minute thrown on top of it. So he wasn't on the ice for the last 11 minutes. And then the lightning go and take a few more penalties. got to kill off a couple of Nashville power plays without one of their best defenders. So yeah, that wasn't great. Uh, but yeah, Johansen was fantastic. Uh, you know, he struggled his first couple of starts coming out of the break, but I thought he played pretty well in his last outing, at least for the back half of it. And then, yeah, he made a bunch of saves in the first period, kept the lightning into it. ⁓ Cooper actually mentioned it in his press conference yesterday, both Johansson and Vasileski. Yes, the lady had been getting behind, but it's the goal. It's the saves that these two are making with that deficit that are keeping the lightning in the game until they figure out their offense. Vasileski did that against Ottawa. ⁓ after that second goal that he gave up, he was lights out. Even both goals that Johansson gave up yesterday. Yeah. The first one he's got a. hockey players shoved into him and the puck just trickles on to him. And then the second one was a double deflection. think Forsberg got credit for it, yeah, Forsberg got credit for the goal. had, tipped it up high and then they had off of board and just do, yeah, hit like 300 things on the way in. you can't fault a goaltender for that. So, know, Johansson, he's the life of a backup goalie, man. It's you sit for two weeks and then you have to come out and like, and the stretch like this, you're trying to get your team points. And he did a really great job last night. It'll be interesting to see how they use him down the stretch. We know Vasilevsky never wants to come out of the game. We know there's a couple more back to backs. Johansson's getting at least two more stars, but you know, Vasi's kind of in that 55 to 56 game mark right now. How much do you want to use him down the stretch? I wouldn't be surprised to see Johansson start that Rangers game, the last game of the season. That way you can give Vasi like a four day break if my math works out correctly before the playoff start. Hanson's got to be a board man. So he always is. He's, he's this guy who just gives them a chance to win every time he goes out there and he's kind of back to that now. want to go back to the Ottawa game on Saturday night. fall down to nothing. As you mentioned early Dylan cousins and Jordan Spence picked up early goals for Ottawa. The first period they were outplayed dramatically. The second period it was all lightning. Gensel and Hagel over the weekend really played well. They were scoring. With Kuturov being out, how important is it for Gensel to start becoming a little bit more of a playmaker? When he's out there right now, he, yeah, he's expected to score, but with the power play with Gensel out there and Kuturov not. Gensel's expected to take up a little more of that half wall. I correct on that? Yeah. Yeah. You're going to see him come out, you know, when Kuch is out there on the power play, Gensel's down low. He has the option to move the puck around or step out. And I thought that was a big thing when the Lightning power play was struggling is Gensel's played down low. He would step out a few times and then open up that space. But like you said, now that Kucherov, you know, hasn't played. He, yeah, he's not the guy who gets to stand in front of the net now and reflect pucks. You know, he does have to come out a little bit more. distribute the puck a little bit more. I thought, ⁓ he did a really good job on Hagel's goal against Nashville. Ryan O'Reilly is trying to kind of skate the puck out, tries to pass off the boards and Gensel picks it off and then feeds it back to the middle. So Gensel is just an interesting player. Cause if you look at him, you're like, what does he do really well? And I don't know if there's anything that stands out about his game other than, you know, probably his hockey IQ. He just knows how to go right to where he needs to be the score. I mean, his shots not exactly lethal. He's not a big dude. His passing is pretty good, but it's not. He's just one these guys who knows how, you know, as simple as it sounds, he just knows how to play hockey and he knows where he needs to be. And he's kind of showed it over the last two games. Like he said, I mean, he showed it since he signed that deal with the Lightning. It's, don't know if there's an argument. know it's only two years into it, but I think it's probably the, you know, at least under the cap area, the best free agent signing that the Lightning have made. And yes, people are going to quibble and say, well, know, technically they traded for him, but he was the number one free agent on the market. They just jumped the gun a couple of days to bring him in. what he's brought to that team, you know, the depth that he's added in that top six is something that they really, really needed. And that's why I think it's like I said, probably the best signing that they've made. one thing I'll say about Jake Gensel and he played in Pittsburgh and I got to see him play pretty much every game. He is really good. at creating space. He's one of those guys that just knows where to go to get the puck. It's that innate ability. Not everybody has it, but he does. And his shot is quick. He gets his shot off fast. You saw it on the breakaway in the Ottawa game. He was, he had a guy draped all over him, yet he's able to turn that puck over and roof it. It's just that innate ability. It's why he's got 300 goals in the league. When he was in Pittsburgh, I think there was thought by some people in the media that he got to that goal scoring level because of Sidney Crosby. And I think now has proved it without a doubt that he is a goal scorer. It's not just being with Sidney Crosby. I always find that already been funny. It's like, well, he's only good because he plays with this guy. And I was like, yeah, but I've kind of watched Pittsburgh a lot, you know, just being friends with you. You kind of. You know, take interest in your friend's team. How many people have played with Sidney Crosby who couldn't score, you know, the same thing with like LeCavier back in the day. How many people were on his line that couldn't score? And there, there is an ability, a talent that you need to be able to play with these top end players and be productive. I mean, it's not like you just go out there and they bounce the puck off of you for 30 goals. You know, maybe Lemieux can do that, but I don't know if Crosby's quite that good yet. Hey, Brown had 49 goals in 1988, 89, but I will say this. Robbie Brown, even though he couldn't skate, Robbie Brown had tremendous hands. You don't get 49 goals in the NHL by being just a body. have to have ability. Exactly. I think that's kind of the Corey Perry stage right now is, know, the guy can't skate. He may be affectionately known as the boat anchor anchor over at raw charge, but, The guy has that innate ability to be kind of like Gensler in the right spot at the right time, and then has the hands to put the goals in. Jake's been great. It's, it's, it's fun to watch him because he is such a small player. You kind of worry about, know, he makes his living in front of the net, but he never seems to get destroyed. You don't see him taking a ton of hits. There were a couple against the Florida game, which was hilarious when, know, he got into his first career fight because you know, Mikulow was basically hit him with a forearm shiver. He's a tough guy. He plays bigger than he is, which is, it speaks to your point on that breakaway. You know, he's not a big guy, but he has that ability to keep people away from the puck when it's on his stick. ⁓ so yeah, it's been fun to watch him play here. The last couple of games, he stepped up. Hagel, I thought Hagel was the best player on the ice against Nashville. He probably should have had, he was good. He was really good, especially in the third, he had that, that breakaway where, you know, it's, it's always impressive when you hit two posts, you know, Hitting one post is one thing, but when he managed to hit both of them and the puck doesn't go in, you know, you gotta, you gotta wonder what she did to make the, ⁓ the goalie gods mad. But that's the thing with Hagel is like, he doesn't really get frustrated. I mean, he gets angry, that's for sure. But you know, he doesn't stop playing and he's going to keep grinding away. And that's kind what he did last night. And that was the move he made on the goal is so subtle, but it was so good. mean, he's got Roman Iosi in front of him. Probably one of the best defenders over the last 10 years. freezes him, freezes the goaltender and then snaps that shot in. I think everybody in the ice kind of thought Hagel was going to pass from the slot. I think it was Perry, he had off to his left. So, you you can see the indecision on Yossi's face after the goal. You know, kind of like raises his head into the sky, but it was just a really nice play. And Hagel does that. mean, Gensel does that. Uh, so rallies like that. mean, these, you got these guys that go to the front of the net. They're not the biggest guys in the world, but they, they find their space, they make their space and they score. when Kutra is out, they've been able to step up and keep the, keep the offense rolling. Before we look forward, I want to mention something about the Ottawa game. Steve Santini played less than two minutes. Was that a coach's decision or was there a reason behind that? It seems like it kind of went back and looked at a couple of his shifts. He had a. Kind of a bad turnover in his last shift, but it definitely didn't look like an injury. think he just kind of got lost on the bench. The Lightning went 11-7 against Ottawa. Nick Paul was out and Kuturov was out. know, both of them had, were dealing with an illness. So they rotated in that extra defenseman. And I think with the way Emil Lilleberg and Charlotte were, Destu were playing. Who were really good on Saturday. They were really good on Saturday. Destu was good on Sunday as well. I think Cooper just didn't want to mess with that. So unfortunately for Santini, he kind of got left on the bench a little bit. But yeah, I didn't see anything as far as an injury. Like I said, was maybe the one turnover out. Cooper wasn't happy about it. They cut to him on the bench and he was gesticulating wildly about something. But I don't think it was like you're getting pulled. I just think it was with the way the game was going, the Lightning were still chasing the deficit at that point. And then once they got rolling, like I said, I think they kind of wanted to keep the pairings as they were. So, you know. It is the life of the seventh defenseman. was just surprised considering the compressed schedule that we talked about. would think that, Hey, let's try to work him in a little bit just to get some minutes off of other guys. But you did mention the stew and Lilleberg. And when I was watching the game on Saturday, they were both really good. I thought that might've been one of the stews best games I've seen him play. He's on a stretch right now. Yeah. He's playing really well. And you can see why. The guy doesn't have a lot of NHL experience, but he's played in the SHL. He's played all over the world. He's been defender. He was named defender of the league over the SHL a couple of years ago, I think. So the guy's got the hockey IQ and we kind of talked about it last podcast where you have to level up your game as the season goes on. And he's done a really great job, especially with Headman now. The decisions he's making are a lot better. He kind of went through, think a little slump a few weeks ago when the Lightning were slumping as well. I thought he was making some. I don't know if they were bad decisions, but risky decisions when he didn't have to. And you're always going to get that he is an offensive minded. Defender he's going to take chances. They're risk takers. It's going to happen. And I think sometimes you learn through your mistakes and he's kind of been doing that. But yeah, he stepped up a little bit, little bird who I thought was kind of struggling before he got hurt this year and then just never really found it. His best stretch of the season has been over the last two weeks. This is. Cooper talks about it all the time. know, somebody's got to step up. you're, if your star players are injured, somebody's got to step up and the Lightning been doing it all year. So it's been fun to watch these guys come up, you know, they're getting the experience. It's going to matter in the, in the postseason. Hopefully Headman's back by then, but now you have this depth built in. So we're to see how it goes from here. But yeah, everybody's been stepping up. They just got to figure out the first period. So, T had been playing these first periods, even everyone be talking about how they're, you know, on a, like I said, eight game point streak or whatever. Just the glaring huge bedazzled elephant in the room right now that they can't get these starts under the way. So once they figure that out and they will, there's still enough time in the season left to kind of get their game to a hundred percent. Justin, we just recap this weekend's games. Now let's take a look ahead. The Montreal Canadians come into Tampa only four points out of first place. They've played the same number of games as the lightning 73. Right now Tampa is tied with Buffalo. Buffalo's played one extra game. Justin one, it's a big game, but to tell us a little bit about the Canadians. Yeah. mean, fast, young team, fun to watch. ⁓ the lightning played him twice in December, the beginning of the month. ⁓ they kind of blew him off the, the, the map a little bit with a six one win. Then, the 28th of December, five, four shootout win for the lightning. So if nothing else, that the game should be entertaining. They're kind of taking on the, the, the style of their coach. Old friend, Marty St. Louis still behind the bench. The silver Fox himself. They're a hard team to play against. They're fast. They're going to run year round. Cole Caulfield is up to what 46 goals now on the year. 46. He's talking about one of the most underrated scorers in the league. mean, this kid doesn't get enough credit for how good he is. Then he gets Nick Suzuki's 91 points. Demidov has come in kind of doing everything you want a rookie to do. He's got 41 helpers on the year. So they got there in that kind of beautiful mix of a lot of young talent on the rise. You got a little bit of veteran leadership in there as well. So they got the Josh Anderson's of the world, Alex New Look contributing down the lineup. Good old Brendan Gallagher still running around doing Brendan Gallagher. real quick about Anderson and not to interrupt you, but Anderson was one of those guys the last couple of years, you always heard of him on the trade block. Yeah. All of a sudden Montreal finds their game and he has a nice role within this team. Justin, I want to ask you Montreal plays an up tempo game. That's what's given Tampa trouble at times, especially when they went through the little bit of a spell right after the Olympic break. Is this a good matchup for Tampa? It's a tough matchup for him. ⁓ the lady who've gotten gotten a little bit better at dealing with speed. mean, this has been something that it's not just this year. where teams with speed have troubled them. Teams that are going to fly the zone, bring the puck down through transition, and then push their defenders back and always give them the lightning trouble. Or if they're quick on the forecheck and the lightning, especially their defense is not exactly known for their speed. So if you're a young fast forward, you can kind of burn them. You can turn them on your entries. You can get to that puck first down low and just cause a little bit of chaos in the zone. So I think what the lightening have to do, it's a, it's a good test for them. You have to stay your defensive structure. If you, if you just do your assigned roles, you know, be where you're supposed to be. You mitigate that speed a little bit. So it'll be good and make sure the light yard chasing the puck. Part of the problem is that they begin running into, especially in the first periods here is they kind of get caught puck watching. Everyone's collapses in on the puck carrier leaving the backside open. We saw it against Ottawa. Some of the chances that didn't go in, you know, Ottawa. think the Seattle game, saw a lot of it, especially the second one. You kind of get focused on the puck carrier, forget about the guy behind him. That pass comes out. He's wide open, gets a great eight chance. So that's what the Montreal is going to try and do to the Lightning. So it'll be a good test for them. Hopefully, you know, they can kind of help out. The matchup should be pretty good. It'll be interesting to see how Cooper assigns his, his top line, that kind of gored defensive line to see how they do. But yeah, it's going to be a good challenge. You know, this is looking like a possible first round matchup for the lightning. So it'll be a good test for him. You'd mentioned Montreal could be a possible first round matchup in your opinion, real quick, best possible first round matchup and worst possible first round matchup. to pick on a team that's near and dear to your heart, but if you do have a little bit of a crossover, I do think Pittsburgh probably at the rate they're going right now is the best matchup for the lightning. just do their, their issues down the middle. Some of the players, the style of game they play, I think kind of fits right in with what the lightning want to go up against. like, you know, would play to the lightning strains. I think Pittsburgh would be, you know, if the light to get that top seed and then, ⁓ you know, Pittsburgh ends up somewhere in the wild card and that can be a pretty good matchup for him. don't, I don't disagree with you there, especially as injured as they are down the middle. I do think the penguins are a little bit more tenacious than people realize. on their third and fourth lines, but they're going to have some matchup issues, especially with the current injury situation. I still think the penguins, if they make it are going to be in one of those wild card spots. They play the Islanders coming up. think it's going to determine who is going to be in the second spot in, the Metro division. But Justin, you talked about the best. Who do you think is the toughest matchup? It's being kind of a. walky way to get there, but if they somehow ended up against Buffalo in the first round, I think we've seen it in the regular season games against them. They got one more against them. They got one more in a couple of weeks against Buffalo, but Buffalo has given them fits. Again, you get back to that fast style of play. Buffalo is just a really good, you kind of wait, keep waiting for the shoe to drop for them. They're not supposed to be this good, you know, based on recent history, but, they're just a good team. It's. long enough in the season, deep enough in the season that they're going to be one of the teams to beat in Eastern Conference. They're going to be up there with the Lightning as far as a tough out. I just don't think their style of play matches really well with the Lightning. So they're going to give them fits. But yeah, so I think they're, they're at the bottom of the list of teams I want to preview against kind of with Columbus as well. Again, I don't know why the Lightning struggle against Columbus. You look at them and you're like, they're Columbus man. Yeah, they're good. got some, do the little things. ⁓ They chip out pucks when they're supposed to, they don't take a lot of chances. And Tampa is a team that, Hey, when you have offensive talent, you're going to take a few more chances because you want to let that offensive talent shine. When that happens, those counter punching teams can give you fits. And I think that's exactly why Columbus gives Tampa trouble. And they have for quite some time back to when A guy we're going to talk about here in a couple seconds. John Tortorella was your coach and Justin he's back in the league. You just can't get rid of the man. Ports is going to be there, man. Before we talk about his role with the Vegas golden Knights, I'm going to get to the nurture marketing trivia question of the day. ⁓ God. Thanks to nurture marketing. That's right. Justin, as I can see your reaction, you're like 72 coaches that have come between John Tortorella and yeah. This one will be a little bit different, but thanks to nurture marketing. ask one question each podcast. asked it to Justin. He gives the answer when he gives the answer email back, checking the bolts at yahoo.com for your entry to win a Nikita Kuturov Jersey compliments of nurture marketing. Justin today's question. John Tortorella has coached six teams in the NHL. Name them. Of course we're going to go with. The Tampa Bay Lightning. Number one on the board. All right. ⁓ see if I could remember his career path of the New York Rangers. That is correct. Number two, Vancouver Canucks. Okay. Now when I came up with this question, I was wondering if you were going to remember the Canucks because he only spent one season there. the Vancouver Canucks is number three. ⁓ Columbus. That is number four. He had a nice stint in Columbus. He had some really good teams in 2016 and in 2017. think there were a team that kind of fit his style of play. Kind of the way I've always described Tortorella is he's going to bring the best out of B and C level players. He's going to make them better. The trade off to that is he's going to bring his starter players back a little bit. Um, he's going to force them to play a more defensive style. Hawk. You you talked about the lightning letting them. letting their offensive players flow and make their mistakes. That's not John Tornarello right there. He's going to make them block shots. Yeah. Yeah. It's right. Yeah. Tammy Panarin, you're going to be blocking shots, buddy. So get used to it. Yeah. So yeah, he kind of raises your middling players up, but he brings down some of your, your top end talent. That being said, if you're a top end talent who shows that you can play responsibly, he's going to let you play as much as you want. ⁓ That was kind of the Marty St. Louis thing, you know. There's the story of, you know, Marty was on the third, fourth line with the Lightning and he's like, what could I do to get more playing time? And coach is like, be responsible and do what you need to do. And that's what Marty did. You know, he gave him a chance and he, you he rolled out the offense, but stayed responsible defensively and you know, became the Marty St. Louis, no one, no one loved. So it's an interesting dichotomy when you play for him, he gets a lot of press for his post game comments. But if you ever listen, he's one of my favorite coaches to listen to. in a long form interview when he's breaking down hockey, it's always interesting to see how he does. So he's fun to listen to. Um, I always liked his back and forth with Larry Brooks. Yeah. Yeah. Him and Larry Brooks never quite got along. I did that. And for those of you who don't know, Larry Brooks is the former New York post, uh, reporter. was the beat writer for the New York Rangers and covered the NHL. And those two used to just go at it. Yeah, unfortunately, I think that kind of takes away that, you know, that kind of labels Tortorella is, you know, kind of this jerk from time to time. I'm not going to sugar coat it. The guy could be a jerk. He's, he's an old school coach, which doesn't really fly in today's NHL a lot. Like I said, if you listen to him, some of his longer interviews and you can find them on YouTube where he's breaking down plays, it's fascinating to watch him break down a play. Craig Kustin's wrote a book a few years ago where he profiled a bunch of coaches and Tortorella was one of them. And he, you know, Kustin's talked about sitting in a room watching plays with. Cinderella and just the way his mind works. He's going to bring that. He's going to bring a level of knowledge to the game, but he's going to make you play. He's going to force you to be responsible in your zone. It's an interesting match in Vegas with such a veteran team. Justin, we still, you still have, you still have one more team. Philadelphia and then Vegas, as you had just mentioned. those six answers, Justin, we have Tampa. We have the Rangers, we have Vancouver, we have Philadelphia, we have Columbus, and now the Vegas Golden Knights. Email back, checkinthebolts at yahoo.com with one of those teams and that will get you registered for the nurture marketing. Nikita Kuturov, he's so Justin, he goes to Vegas. He's only signed through the remainder of this season. So there's no guarantee he's going to be the coach of Vegas next year. He's 67 years old right now. Yeah. So this could be a one and done Vegas has really been struggling. Why did they make this move? The timing is so weird. think. Ruz Cassidy would have been given a little bit more rope. mean, they're still in a playoff spot. They're going to Stanley cup with them. Yeah. And it wasn't that long ago. It was only a couple of years ago. We were looking it up earlier. ⁓ least according to nights on ice, which is one of those Vegas websites, you know, he led them to the, ⁓ Stanley cup championship in 2023. He's never missed the playoffs in the four years he was there. He's 178, 99 and 43. Yes, they're struggling right now. They're in third place in the pillow fight division to use Connor McDavid's term for it. But you get into playoffs, you go on a run, your goaltender gets hot. I thought they would at least give him through the playoffs. Now if they had flamed out in the first round, okay, now you got a case to, to fire him. But the fact that they're what they're 32, 26 and 16. it's a decent record. Yeah. But so does everybody else in that division. You mentioned they're just fortunate. They're in the Pacific. There are three wins away from winning the division. mean, it's, but this team is, it's been banged up. It's not anywhere near as good as the cup team a couple years ago. I think the expectations are honestly a little bit too high in Vegas right now. Yeah. You wonder about that. What do they think this team is? You know, Is Twitter, I'm going to be able to push them over the edge. don't know. He doesn't change their goal-tending. He doesn't change their depth or like you said, the injury and he's not a doctor for God's sakes. So yeah, it's going to be seen. Maybe they felt they needed a little more discipline in the locker room. Who knows? Maybe they needed a, know, maybe Cassidy was too much of a player's coach. And, ⁓ it's always fascinating when they make moves like this, you know, it's kind of like the LA Kings move coming out of the break. The timing is just so odd for it. So, but we'll see how goes. You get that new coach bump win three or four games and then they look like geniuses, but yeah, they are. So they got there in third place in the Pacific. There's six points behind Anaheim right now. are a couple points clear of the wild card spot. Now, the one thing I do want to say though, when you take a player's coach like Cassidy was in Vegas and you replace him with a disciplinarian like Tortorella. Sometimes that voice in the locker room can change things. You start looking at that attention to detail a little bit differently by just hearing a different voice. But with eight games left in the season, and I was going back into my recollection of people who had been fired late in the year. I remember in 2000, the devils fired Robbie Fatorik. I think in middle of March, they replaced him with Larry Robinson. They, they go and win the cup. Trader Phil, when he was the general manager and probably what got him fired in New York in 1989, fired Michelle Bergeron with two games left, put himself in as the head coach and lost the next six and next thing you know, he was fired. So it can go either way, but I understand you want to become more disciplined, more defensive oriented, and just have some more attention to detail. I just. I look at this Vegas team. I don't see them as a cup contender, whether it's with Tortorella or with Cassidy and just bringing him in for a few games. see that as a panic move, not, let's try to write the ship. never know what's going on behind the scenes. Maybe they were talking to Cassidy and things blew up and you know, they just decided it wasn't something that can work moving forward, especially This year where you don't have a lot of days off. It's not like Twitter, Alan come in and install his system. Uh, when you're playing every other day. You're just going, you're just going for a different voice. That's all you're doing. It's a hundred percent right there. mean, it's yeah, you're just looking for someone else behind the bench right now, a different message coming across. So we'll see how it pays off. You know, it could move, end up being the move of the year. We never know. That's, that's what I love about these things is we can speculate as much as we want, but until they actually go out on the ice and see how they perform. You just don't know. is such a weak division that if they can win up, know, string up a couple of wins with Tortorella, they get that number one seed. They get to avoid, you know, Colorado and Dallas and Minnesota, you know, the good teams in the West. yeah, they can avoid them till the conference final. Okay. Now, now Tortorella has had a chance to get his message across, get his system in a little bit. Now we can kind of sneak one out. They, they feel like a first or second round team that's going to lose somewhere. Justin, it's been nothing but. Games and recaps games and recaps. You've been really busy over there at raw charge. Tell us what's going on. fatigue is real, man. The fatigue is real. So be diving into taking a look at, kind of what's going on over the last few games, kind of get a recap end of another month. we'll, we're going to look at the March numbers and see what kind of happened over the last few weeks. feels like a tale of two different months. You know, they got off to such a slow start, but then went on that road trip and really felt like they got the defense. If nothing else, they got their defense working again. So we'll look at the numbers and see what they have to say about that. Start working on those playoff reviews. And, um, you know, kind of talked about a little bit today and see what kind of matchups we got going on and, and how the light year and I closed this thing out. at fact checking the bolts, we will be back on Wednesday. We are going to recap the bolts and the Montreal Canadians, and they'll have two more games left on this current seven game home stand against the Penguins and the Boston Bruins. We'll take a look at those two games moving forward. We'll also have our final nurture marketing trivia question of the day for the month of March for the Nikita Kucherov jersey. First of all, we just hit 1000 YouTube subscribers. Thank you very much. Please hit the like and subscribe button for Justin Godfrey, who you could see at www.rawcharge.com. I'm Jason Lankes. Thank you for joining us today. We'll see you on Wednesday and go bolts. Awards. Thank you for listening to back checking the bolts. We are free and available on all platforms, including Apple, Spotify, I heart radio, Amazon, YouTube, and Deezer. If you enjoyed it, please be sure to subscribe and leave a review. You can follow Justin on blue sky at raw charge.com. You can follow the show on X at Tampa underscore bolts underscore pod and on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube at back checking the bolts. 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